Jem's demons
by thefreshestandthebest
Summary: Jem and Tessa in Shanghai. Angst.


Tessa was jostled awake by movement next to her.

The hotel room was dark; only moonlight spilled through the sheer curtains. Faintly, she could hear street noise outside: cars and buses rushing by, honking occasionally. The Huangpu River sloshing as late night tour boats sailed to and fro. A cursory glance around the room revealed nothing odd to Tessa, who turned to face the sleeping form beside her.

Jem lay still, his bare chest rising and falling slowly in slumber. His face was relaxed. His spidery lashes threw delicate shadows under his eyes. The Brotherhood runes on his cheeks were dark in the moonlight, but Tessa thought they looked entirely natural on his fine-boned face. For a while Tessa simply watched as he slept.

Their first day in Shanghai had been beautiful, but poignant. They had strolled along the Bund and visited Yu Garden, blending in with tourists as they gaped and took pictures. On a street corner they had xie ke huang-crab shell pies-a childhood favorite of Jem's. When Tessa remarked that Shanghai must have changed immensely since he lived here as a child, he only smiled wistfully, a faraway look in his eyes. "Yes," he replied, "and so has the Institute."

The Shanghai Institute was rebuilt after Yanluo had terrorized its residents and destroyed its foundations so many years ago. Today it was a gleaming building in the mundane guise of an abandoned construction area. When Tessa asked if he wanted to go inside, Jem refused. "Not today," was all he'd said.

Now he slept peacefully under Tessa's eye. She was about to go back to sleep when suddenly Jem grasped the bedsheet between them tightly, a wrinkle creasing his brow. He shifted uneasily at first, and then his movements became more frantic. Tugging the duvet up to his chest, he rolled onto his side, away from Tessa. Tears began to stream from under his closed eyelids, and he was murmuring.

"Jem!" said Tessa, trying to wake him from his nightmare. He was speaking in Mandarin. As he raised his voice, she heard him say: "... no no no no no no, please not her. She is all I have in the world. Please, please, no..." As he started tossing again, Tessa jostled his shoulder with even more force.

"Jem, please wake up, you're having a bad dream," she pleaded. She couldn't bear to see him in such pain. Finally his eyes flew open; they were frantic, searching the room. His gaze passed over her, not seeing her. Then he sat up abruptly, the duvet pooling around his hips.

"You're dead!" Jem said in disbelief. "Th-They said they killed you, so how are you still here? Why do you hurt her? Why... why do you still hurt me?" A tear slipped down his cheek. He said the last part quietly, and Tessa's heart broke. He looked so very helpless, and once again Tessa thought of the way his youth was ripped from him so many years ago. His vulnerability now was painful to behold. Tessa cupped his face in her hands, pulling his face close in front of hers.

"Jem, it's me, Tessa. Listen to me. You need to wake up. Just follow my voice." She held him like this for a moment, her eyes searching his for any sign of recognition. His gaze dropped. Slowly the pain in his face went away, replaced by confusion. When he met her gaze again, she knew that he was truly awake.

"Tessa? You're alright?" he whispered. She sighed in relief.

"You were having a nightmare, Jem."

"Are... are you sure? He was right there..." he trailed off. Slowly, he looked her over. Took in her tousled hair, strands escaping their plait. Her hands had dropped to his shoulders; slowly he covered her hands with his. Her grey eyes were wide with worry-for him. She was wearing the same oversized T-shirt that she had worn when they went to bed. No blood. No sign of Yanluo.

"I'm fine. See?" Tessa said quietly. She reached out a tentative hand to smooth his hair.

"Tessa..." Jem began, and then-at a loss for words-he caught her up in a tight embrace. Tessa held him just as close; his frame was trembling, and she could feel his heart fluttering against hers.

She hesitated for a moment before asking in his ear, "Do you want to tell me about it?"

Reluctantly he pulled away, but he kept her close as he told her of how Yanluo came to him in his dream, how he was eleven and trapped again, the poison boiling his veins as the demon sifted through his mind like knives combing through every emotion he ever felt in the past hundred and forty years. It was agony. But it became utterly unbearable when the demon suddenly held up Tessa's naked, limp form between its bloody forceps.

"I'm sorry, Tessa, I didn't mean to wake you," Jem was saying now. "I think that somehow, being in Shanghai again, is bringing back feelings and memories that I haven't confronted for a very long time. I thought I would be fine-Shanghai is so different now, so much has changed from the city I left in 1873."

"Don't apologize," Tessa replied. "I was worried that certain... thoughts and feelings you might have about coming back here would be difficult. I'm sorry."

"No," he said quietly, "I wanted to come, Tessa. I always knew that I would return one day. Yanluo can't scare me forever, and I won't let him have that power over me anymore. Don't feel bad for asking me if I wanted to come back, Tessa, because I know that if it's with you, with you beside me-my answer is always yes. It will always be yes." His voice dropped to a whisper. "I promised you that I would go everywhere and anywhere with you."

Jem turned to her completely; his face was so close to hers now. Tessa could count each of his beautiful long lashes, and she saw the gold flecks in his eyes brighten as they lighted on her. And she remembered his tearful _Yes, of course, yes,_ when she asked him to see the world with her, that January afternoon on Blackfriars Bridge. Even through all those years when he was a Silent Brother, she never forgot how deeply Jem felt, but it had become longer and longer since she had felt his emotions-so pure and contagious-pour from him. She recalled now the memory of the night he asked to marry her, kneeling on the floor of her moonlit room in the London Institute, pouring happiness into her lap when she finally said _Yes, yes, I will marry you, James Carstairs. Yes._

She would often think back on this memory, of how she felt like she was holding sunlight in her arms in that moonlit room. Now they were together at last, seeing the world together and creating countless other perfect moments. She never thought it would come at a price.

"I know, and I love you," Tessa said. "The last thing I would ever want is to cause you pain... Jem, you said in your sleep that I'm all you have in the world. Well, you are all I have in the world, too. If there is something we can do to rid you of the demon's hold over you, I want to help you."

He looked down. "Perhaps it is because I have not yet revisited the place where it all began. Still could not bring myself, after all these years, to set foot there again." He looked up at her then. In his eyes, she understood the words as clearly as if he'd said them. The Institute.

* * *

Jem mentioned that distant relatives on his mother's side were here. As he and Tessa stood outside the Shanghai Institute, Tessa could feel the anxiety radiating from him, anxiety that he had hidden quite well the day before.

"It's been over a century, so I suppose I'm as ready as I'll ever be," Jem said with a nervous smile. Tessa squeezed his hand in reassurance.

"I'll be right beside you."

Jem lifted the knocker slowly and let it crash down. He stared at the door uncomfortably and shifted his feet. His hand was hot in Tessa's.

The door opened to reveal a young woman with long raven hair. As she took in the couple before her, Tessa observed that she had a fierce yet kind face. Her voice was authoritative when she spoke.

"Ni shi shei?" _Who are you?_

"Wo shi Ke Jian Ming," Jem said. "Zhe shi Tessa Gray."

"Ke Jian Ming... Carstairs," the woman said wonderingly. She pulled the door wider and stepped aside. "Come in."

The woman introduced herself as Cai Li Ti, Head of the Shanghai Institute. She told them that she knew the stories from back in the nineteenth century, of how the demon Yanluo infiltrated the Institute, tore apart the Carstairs family, and corrupted the protective wards. Among those killed in the attack was an ancestor of hers, Ke Wen Yu-Jem's mother. Until now it had all been just a story.

"We've heard whispers," Li said, "passed down through generations, that the surviving Carstairs from this tragedy joined the Brotherhood not long after fleeing Shanghai. We knew not the circumstances, nor any other details... After all this time, why have you come back?"

"I have only recently found a cure to Yanluo's curse that allowed me to leave the Brotherhood," Jem replied. "We came to Shanghai not thinking I would be haunted by what happened the last time I was here, but I was wrong. This place has changed, but it's on the same plot of earth where my parents died and I was helpless to save them. I've come to put my demons to rest."

Li looked at Jem for a long moment, then nodded understandingly. "Yes, of course. Tell me what you need."

* * *

Two hours later, Jem and Tessa emerged onto the Institute steps. The streets were busy with passersby and vehicles alike, and the day was hot. For a moment they simply stood in silence, watching the beating heart of Shanghai.

"After so many years of seeing human emotions-including my own-through a glass," Jem said finally, "I must have convinced myself that I could no longer be affected by bad memories from my past. But coming back to the human world, to my birthplace... It's like a piece of my humanity that I never knew was missing has returned to me."

Tessa took a step closer to him. "I never doubted your humanity, Jem, not even when you were a Silent Brother."

He was silent for a moment, but then he smiled down at her, a glint in his eye. "I knew there was a reason I loved you."

"There he is," Tessa said laughingly.

Nobody noticed the young couple emerge from the old construction site, hand in hand, strolling down the pavement as the walk sign lit up at the street corner. Just as inconspicuously, they joined the sea of humanity there, wading into its busy currents.


End file.
